Farewell from the UK, My Polish Friends

A recession-ravaged UK is now saying farewell to our Polish immigrants who are migrating back East to survive.

A recent story in The Sun details how many now unemployed and often homeless Poles are receiving assistance in returning home: every fortnight a free minibus leaves Hammersmith in West London packed
with Poles left destitute after their dream of finding riches here turned sour.

After Poland joined the European Union in 2004, the United Kingdom experienced it's greatest migration ever; an estimated 1.3million Poles moved to Britain and Ireland, creating alot of labour work, but also putting plenty of Britain's finest out of work.

Although the influx of Polish builders, decorators, electricians, and plumbers helped build Britain in the boom years, massive numbers of Poles are now leaving the country because the economy has simply dried up, and the recent 'bust' has taken away their jobs. The exodus back East has not hit mass proportions, but fewer are also migrating West.

In contrast, Poland's economy has had a recent surge. EU figures reveal that unemployment has fallen from 19.7 per cent in 2003 to 6.8 per cent this July, and wages have gone up, now averaging nearly 3,000 zlotys (£660) per month.

Most of the builders admit they were working cash-in-hand as part of Britain's black economy.

3 comments

Adam

Wishfull thinking.. None of my friends left UK since 2006 and they are builders, bartenders, waiters, programmers, engineers and so on.. Some have skills and degrees some have just skills but they're staying here. Even if it's harder now because of high living costs it's still good enough to stay. For the same job we're paid 6x more than in Poland and 1.5 - 2 x less than UK employee.. That's market economy..

Recently I went to Poland on a hoiliday. I must admit, Polish people are really friendly and are really helpful. Most of the people I came across have lived and worked in the UK in the past and they don't want to come back to UK ever (yes, ever!)! They say its hard work in UK and we Brits don't respect them and treat them badly (atleast the people they have come across in their work places. They have gone through bad experiences.). Some of the youngsters I met have worked in UK to save some money, because of the bad treatment they have gone through, they went back to Poland and they want to study further to get better jobs and some level of respect they deserve. Good for their economy.

Come off it - how can you quote the sun! If you read the article on the sun website, they have no evidence other than 1 man out of the 1 million Polish people in the UK. Trust me, don't copy articles from the sun... unless you are taking the piss out them!!